[JURIST] Allegations of recruiting violations by the US military increased from 4,400 cases in 2004 to 6,600 cases in 2005 according to a report [text, PDF; abstract; highlights, PDF] released by the US Government Accountability Office (GAO) [official website] on Monday, with actual criminal violations rising by more than 200 percent, from 30 in 2004 to 70 in 2005. The report noted that due to the current environment, with fewer potential recruits coming forward while numbers were needed for service in Iraq and elsewhere, "some recruiters, reportedly, have resorted to overly aggressive tactics, such as coercion and harassment."

The US Department of Defense [official website] concurred or partially concurred with four of the GAO's five recommendations for tracking and reporting recruiting violations, allegations and irregularities when it viewed a draft of the report. Reuters has more.

[JURIST] US Chief Justice John Roberts [official profile, PDF] named Jeffrey P. Minear [Georgetown University Law Center faculty profile], former senior litigation counsel in the Office of the Solicitor General [official website], as his top aide on Monday. Minear and Roberts worked together for four years at the solicitor general's office and also on the Microsoft antitrust suit. Commenting on his time working alongside Minear, Roberts said in a statement, "I have seen firsthand his strong commitment to the Supreme Court as an institution and his respect for its role in our system of government." In total, Minear has argued 56 cases [list] before the US Supreme Court.

In his new role, Minear will assist with the running and monitoring of judicial issues, including court reform. He will replace current aide Sally M. Rider [Washington Post report], who has been appointed [press release] director of the William H. Rehnquist Center on the Constitutional Structures of Government at the University of Arizona. Minear will assume his new position on September 11th. AP has more.

[JURIST] Legal Services Corp. [official website; ABA backgrounder], a government-funded non-profit corporation that provides legal assistance to indigent Americans, has been using funds to provide luxuries for its board members and executives, AP reported Monday. The corporation turns away about half of all applicants due to lack of monetary resources, yet agency documents obtained by AP show that federal funding has recently been used for expensive meals, hired drivers, and conferences at the Melrose Hotel located minutes from the corporation's Georgetown headquarters. The expenditures did not all go unchallenged, however: Legal Services Corp. comptroller David Richardson suggested in one internal memo that the $400-plus personal driver expenses incurred by board chairman Frank Strickland [official profile] were excessive.

Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA) [official profile], US Senate Finance Committee [official website] chairman, has stated that if the corporation does not curb its "waste and abuse," future federal funding will be withheld. The White House has already targeted the LSC for cutbacks and Grassley and other conservative Republican lawmakers have long criticized it [1995 Republican Policy Committee report, PDF] for alleged political bias. AP has more.

[JURIST] The Nigerian military withdrew from part of the disputed Bakassi peninsula [UN backgrounder; Wikipedia backgrounder] on Monday, nearly four years after the International Court of Justice ruled [ICJ materials] that the territory and its oil reserves should be handed over to Cameroon. Implementation of the ICJ ruling was turned over to a special UN-appointed commission [UN backgrounder], under which a withdrawal was eventually negotiated. A ceremony lowering a Nigerian flag and raising that of Cameroon formally marked the transfer of control over the northern part of the peninsula; the rest will remain under Nigerian civilian control for two more years.

Most residents of Bakassi say they plan to leave the peninsula to be resettled elsewhere in Nigeria, but they are permitted to remain and abide by Cameroonian rule. The two nations' dispute over the territory [backgrounder] flared into bloodshed in 1981 and 1994. BBC News has more. From Lagos, Vanguard has local coverage.

[JURIST] The Middle East ceasefire directed in a UN resolution [text; JURIST report] adopted Friday that took effect at 8 AM local time (0500 GMT) Monday, "appears to be generally holding," Secretary-General Kofi Annan [official profile; JURIST news archive] has said in a statement [text]. The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) reported [press release text] that it knew of no "incidents or breaches of the agreement" as of 1 PM. Israeli media nevertheless reported isolated violence, including four skirmishes in which six Hezbollah fighters were killed [Ha'aretz report], while Iran's state news agency claimed that Israeli forces had already violated Resolution 1701 [IRNA report] by fatally shooting a Hezbollah fighter near the Litani River in southern Lebanon. The UN News Centre has more.

Meanwhile, the Adalah [advocacy website] center for Arab minority rights in Israel has sent a letter to Israeli Attorney General Menahem Mazuz [official profile] claiming that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) [official website] have committed war crimes by killing civilians, bombing villages and demolishing houses in the latest hostilities. Ha'aretz has more. In an address to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva Friday UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour again [JURIST report] raised the specter of personal criminal liability for violations of laws regulating the conduct of hostilities, pointedly reminding all belligerents that "war crimes and crimes against humanity may be committed even by those who believe, accurately or not, that their combat is a just one and their cause a worthy pursuit."

[JURIST] Australia [JURIST news archive] will pursue the return of David Hicks [JURIST news archive] from the US detention center at Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archive] if new charges are not brought and a military tribunal formed by November, Australian Attorney General Philip Ruddock [official profile] told the Sydney Morning Herald on Monday. Such a promise was made by US Attorney General Alberto Gonzales [official profile], Ruddock said, and if it is not kept, the Australian government will seek Hicks' return, as it did with another Guantanamo detainee, Mamdouh Habib [BBC profile]. Ruddock's comments mark the first time the Australian government has publicly suggested that Hicks might leave Guantanamo without a trial. Ruddock said that if Hicks does return to Australia, he will not be charged there because he did not break Australian laws.

Hicks has been held at Guantanamo since late 2001, when he was captured in Afghanistan - where he allegedly fought for the Taliban - and turned over to US forces. Accused [charges, PDF] of conspiracy to commit war crimes, aiding the enemy and attempted murder, Hicks was one of ten Guantanamo detainees facing trial by military commissions [JURIST news archive]. The US Supreme Court ruled [JURIST report] in June, however, that the commissions as constituted were illegal under military law and the Geneva Conventions, forcing Congress to write legislation authorizing them - which may not occur before US mid-term elections in November. On Sunday, a lawyer for Hicks predicted that his client may remain in US military custody for up to seven more years [JURIST report] because of likely legal challenges to whatever replacement system is eventually established to try the Guantanamo detainees. The Sydney Morning Herald has more.

[JURIST] Leaders of the rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) [BBC backgrounder] will not be arrested if they attend peace talks with the Ugandan government in Sudan, a UN Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) [official website] official said Monday. The talks began in July but were adjourned last week because the rebels and government could not agree on terms to halt hostilities in Uganda [JURIST news archive]. Though the International Criminal Court (ICC) [official website] has several outstanding indictments against LRA leaders, UNMIS southern region coordinator James Ellery said "there are no plans to make arrests in Sudan," so LRA leaders should not use the indictments as "an excuse" to avoid the talks.

To entice LRA leader Joseph Kony [BBC profile] and other top rebels to the peace talks, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni [official website; BBC profile] offered conditional amnesty [JURIST report] to Kony in July if he denounced terrorism. LRA leaders promptly rejected the amnesty offer [JURIST report], saying that accepting amnesty "presupposes surrender" and would mean the LRA is no longer available to discussion. In yet another attempt to bring Kony to the table, Ugandan Security Minister Amama Mbabazi asked the ICC to retract its indictments [JURIST report] accusing several LRA leaders of war crimes. Kony was indicted by the ICC [JURIST report; PDF arrest warrant] along with four LRA lieutenants last October on charges that they orchestrated the killing of thousands of civilians and the enslavement of thousands more children over two decades of conflict with Museveni's government. Reuters has more. AP and the Sudan Tribune have additional coverage.

[JURIST] The Japanese Justice Ministry [official website, English version] has introduced plans for a new court process that will allow crime victims to sue for damages in a civil lawsuit that runs simultaneously with a criminal trial. In an effort to help speed up compensation for victims, the planned system will allow crime victims to use evidence from the criminal trial without any hindering court procedures. The current system requires victims to file civil lawsuits separately from criminal cases, and different judges handle both cases using different court procedures, but the proposed system will put the civil lawsuits under the jurisdiction of the judge presiding over the criminal case.

The Justice Ministry plans to ask the Legislative Council to begin consideration of the plan and submit a report in February. After that, the Justice Ministry will submit a bill to the National Diet of Japan [official website], the Japanese legislature, to implement the planned legal system next year. The proposed system will likely only apply to serious crimes, such as murder, violent robbery and rape, and will exclude economic crimes. The proposed legal system came in response to the 1999 Justice System Reform Promotion Act [official backgrounder], which called for an investigation into the country's legal system and a comprehensive report on how to improve the system under the guide of the Office for Promotion of Justice System Reform [official website]. Japan's Daily Yomiuri has more.

[JURIST] Australian Prime Minister John Howard [official website] on Monday abandoned the proposed Migration Amendment (Designated Unauthorised Arrivals) Bill [PDF text] that would have required asylum seekers arriving by boat to be processed at offshore camps after it became apparent that the Senate would not approve the bill [JURIST report]. Senator Judith Troeth, a member of the governing Liberal Party [party website], voiced opposition to the bill and told Howard that she would vote against it. Howard's Liberal Party maintains only a one vote majority in the Senate, and Howard chose to withdraw the bill [press conference transcript] rather than face defeat.

Last week, the House of Representatives approved the bill [JURIST report] by a measure of 78-62, but faced strong opposition from four MPs in the governing party. Critics of the bill have condemned Howard for catering to Indonesia to resolve a diplomatic dispute between the two countries that arose after Australia gave visas to more than 40 Indonesian asylum seekers [BBC report] from Indonesia's Papua province earlier this year. Shortly after Howard withdrew the bill, eight new asylum seekers arrived on Australian soil. The Indonesian government also warned that a flood of refugees would likely head towards Australia soon [Australian report]. AAP has more.

[JURIST] Judge Abdullah al-Amiri, a Shiite judge, will preside over the second Saddam Hussein trial [JURIST news archive] by the Iraqi High Tribunal, this one involving the so-called "Anfal" operation [HRW backgrounder] that killed 100,000 Kurds in northern Iraq in the 1980s. In the new trial, scheduled to begin on August 21 [JURIST report], Hussein and six co-defendants are charged with genocide and crimes against humanity [JURIST report]. Munqith Takleef al-Firuan will serve as the chief prosecutor, a court official said Sunday.

Hussein's first trial, on charges of crimes against humanity stemming from the alleged execution of 148 Shiites in response to a 1982 assassination attempt in Dujail, has been adjourned until October 16 [JURIST reports]. Both sides have presented closing arguments and are awaiting a verdict for Hussein and seven co-defendants. The prosecution called for the death penalty, while court-appointed lawyers presented the closing arguments for Hussein and some of his co-defendants because their defense team boycotted trial proceedings in protest of poor security after the murder of a defense lawyer in June [JURIST reports]. AP has more.

[JURIST] Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador [campaign website, in Spanish; Wikipedia profile], the leftist candidate challenging the results of Mexico's disputed July 2 presidential election [JURIST report], said Sunday that his supporters would continue their protests [JURIST report] in Mexico City until September or later, unless the Federal Electoral Tribunal [official website, in Spanish] orders a full ballot-by-ballot recount of votes. After rejecting Lopez Obrador's request for a full recount [JURIST report] on August 5, the court ordered a partial recount at nine percent of the nation's polling stations. Lopez Obrador said Friday that inconsistencies evident from the partial recount [JURIST report] show enough errors in the tally that the electoral court should declare Lopez Obrador president-elect.

Lopez Obrador supporters have staged protests in Mexico City since the beginning of August, causing traffic jams and business delays at the headquarters of many major corporations located in the city, demanding a full recount of the votes. Lopez Obrador lost to conservative candidate Felipe Calderon [campaign website, in Spanish; Wikipedia profile] by just 0.6 percent of the vote [JURIST report], but Lopez Obrador supporters claim that fraudulent election practices [JURIST report] allowed Calderon to win the election. Election officials have not yet confirmed Calderon as the winner. AP has more.

[JURIST] US Department of Homeland Security [official website] Secretary Michael Chertoff [official profile] suggested Sunday that the US could benefit from revised anti-terror laws that allow for increased electronic surveillance of terror suspects. Chertoff, who also suggested that the US consider allowing increased detention of terror suspects while speaking on Fox News Sunday [podcast] and ABC's This Week [recorded video], cited last week's thwarted terror plot in Britain [JURIST report] as an example of wider surveillance powers that allowed British authorities to arrest over 20 people and prevent an imminent terrorist attack. British authorities were able to act quickly and "to operate based on fast-moving information," according to Chertoff. Chertoff said that US laws needed to be constantly reviewed in order to ensure that "they're helping us, not hindering us" and that "maximum flexibility" in monitoring suspects' communications and other transactions is necessary in order to disrupt future terror plots.

The public disclosure of the National Security Agency's domestic surveillance program [JURIST news archive] last year prompted many lawmakers to question the legality of the warrantless wiretaps used to intercept communications of suspected terrorists when one party to the communication is outside the US. US Sen. Arlen Specter said last month that President Bush has agreed to sign [JURIST report] legislation authorizing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court [FJC backgrounder] to review the domestic spying program. AP has more.